Wednesday, January 21, 2009

Stir, Steer.

I don't know why this suddenly came to me: a fragment of memory. High school. It must have been 1992. We were all members of the grammar police in my section. And we had one teacher -- a hapless young substitute teacher -- who kept pronouncing "stir" as "steer." It was grating in our ears. Late one afternoon, we all gathered together to make a plan. We were going to teach our substitute teacher a lesson. Every time she would say "steer," we would all say, together, "stir."

The next day:

Substitute Teacher: "Now, class this is how you 'steer' in the egg yolk..."

Us: (altogether) "Stir."

(Substitute Teacher suddenly has a confused look on her face.)

Substitute Teacher: "Umm. So now, do you know how to 'steer' in the ingredients?"

Us: (altogether) "Stir."

Substitute Teacher: (suddenly red-faced) "Eh. Umm. Do ... you ... now ... know how to ... 'stir' ... in ... the ingredients?"

High school is evil.

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